Half a Dozen Arrowshttps://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com
The Life & Times of the Ferguson Family Mon, 17 Jul 2017 19:55:11 +0000enhourly1http://wordpress.com/https://s2.wp.com/i/buttonw-com.pngHalf a Dozen Arrowshttps://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com
Orange County to Saint George via Las Vegas – Fergie Summer Adventure 2017, day 1https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/07/17/orange-county-to-saint-george-via-las-vegas-fergie-summer-adventure-2017-day-1/
https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/07/17/orange-county-to-saint-george-via-las-vegas-fergie-summer-adventure-2017-day-1/#respondMon, 17 Jul 2017 19:49:41 +0000http://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/?p=800Continue reading Orange County to Saint George via Las Vegas – Fergie Summer Adventure 2017, day 1]]>After months of planning, re-planning, booking, and re-booking, July 7th finally arrived, and we were ready to hit the road for our 33 day summer adventure!
Finley gave a big thumbs up – she was ready to roll!

We got on the road right after work on a Friday afternoon, with the goal to get out of Southern California as quickly as we could, stop in Las Vegas for dinner, and finish our day in St. George, Utah.

Traffic was about as good as we could have hoped, especially on a Friday afternoon heading toward Vegas! The temperatures, however….yikes. Thankful for a brand new car with brand new a/c.

We made it to Vegas with just one short stop in Victorville (or was it Barstow???), and arrived just in time to visit the brand new Cracker Barrel for dinner.

The Cracker Barrel on Dean Martin drive across the 15 from the strip is easy to get to from the highway, nice and big, and a great place to fill your belly and stretch your legs.

After dinner, we wanted to show the kiddos the Bellagio fountains, so we drove over the 15 to the strip. Parking at the Aria or Cosmopolitan is free for the first hour and just a short walk from the Bellagio. You can also park at the Bellagio for an hour for free as of our trip in 2017. Most of the walk can be done indoors out of the heat through the hotels, casinos, and shopping mall!

Following our Las Vegas pitstop, we hopped back on the 15 freeway, and less than 2 hours later we were at our resting place for the night.

I will be making LOTS of recommendations and suggestions from our trip experience that will hopefully help some of you planning yours. I DO NOT RECOMMEND the America’s Best Value Inn in St. George, Utah. Trust me. I will have several great and budget friendly hotel recommendations for other parts of our trip to share, though!

]]>https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/07/17/orange-county-to-saint-george-via-las-vegas-fergie-summer-adventure-2017-day-1/feed/0halfadozenarrowsIMG_20170707_231729_672IMG_20170707_231811_504IMG_20170707_233112_015IMG_20170707_233246_288IMG_20170707_233455_092#kcsfab40 Trip – DAY SIX – Headed Home!https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/26/kcsfab40-trip-day-six-headed-home/
https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/26/kcsfab40-trip-day-six-headed-home/#respondMon, 26 Jun 2017 21:32:05 +0000http://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/?p=776Continue reading #kcsfab40 Trip – DAY SIX – Headed Home!]]>Last day! It’s always a little sad for vacation to end, but we were also thrilled to get back home to our babies. We had to be at the airport in the late afternoon, so we did a few last things in the city before heading back to Newark.

We spent some time walking around, and visited Bryant Park and the main branch of the New York City public library, which was beautiful!

From there, we walked to Grand Central Station and took in the sights. It really is pretty awesome to see in person!

After Grand Central, we did something really cool. We took the Roosevelt Island tram over to…you guessed it…Roosevelt Island. The tram is part of the subway system and fare is included with your Metro Card. It crosses the East River taking passengers back and forth from Roosevelt Island. Fun way to get up and see some cool NYC views. You may recognize the tram from movies like Spiderman!

After the tram, we walked just a few short blocks to Serendipity. Frozen hot chocolate? Don’t have to twist my arm! We waited way more than an hour for a table here, but once we got it, we realized they were seating us at what they call “The Movie Table.” Check it out!

After Serendipity, it was back to Jersey City to grab our car, then a stop at a mall in New Jersey before heading to the airport and back home.
What an awesome week!

]]>https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/26/kcsfab40-trip-day-six-headed-home/feed/0halfadozenarrows20161206_1210589ba3a868-2e4c-4e88-9b1e-2572489e29449dcb88e0137649590b755372b040afad#kcsfab40 Trip – DAY FIVE!https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/26/kcsfab40-trip-day-five/
https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/26/kcsfab40-trip-day-five/#respondMon, 26 Jun 2017 17:46:34 +0000http://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/?p=723Continue reading #kcsfab40 Trip – DAY FIVE!]]>Wow! Day five may have been our favorite day on this trip. It was jam packed and even included crossing off a bucket list item or two.

Our day started at the 9/11 memorial and museum. Please, make sure you include this into your New York itinerary, no matter how short or long your visit will be. Anyone old enough to clearly remember that day in 2001 needs to experience this. It really was amazing. It’s best to make an appointment ahead of time for your tour, so we got online the evening before to set up our Monday morning tour time. I’ll share the link for doing that at the end of this post. For being a large museum full of tons of people, it is astonishingly quiet and somber in that building. There are many areas where photography is not allowed, but here are a few of the photos we were able to take in certain areas.

It is a good idea to emotionally prepare for this museum. You will cry. You will be horrified. You will feel the enormity of standing in the spots where these cowardly attacks happened. It is a lot. If you go into it knowing and expecting that, I think you’ll get more out of the experience.

From the 911memorial.org website: “The historic Vesey Street stair remnant is placed in the National September 11 Memorial Museum. This artifact, known as the “Survivors’ Stairs,” remains as an authentic “silent witness” to the events of 9/11. During the attacks of September 11, 2001, this stairway served as a vital route to safety for many people. The stairs were mostly intact immediately after 9/11, but they were significantly damaged during the nine-month recovery period. The stairway provides a powerful reference to the survivors’ story as well as a commemoration of the recovery period. It is also the sole vestige above ground of the World Trade Center, a major 20th-century architectural complex and engineering achievement. The stair remnant originally weighed 175 tons and stood 22 feet tall.”

Following our morning at the 9/11 Memorial, we were ready for some fresh air and lunch. What better place to enjoy that then Madison Square Park and Shake Shack! This is the original location of Shake Shack and started from a hot dog cart in the park to raise funds for the park’s conservancy. It was such a hit that the chain has expanded, and we even have one in Southern California now.

Here’s some advice for your New York trip: Go to Shake Shack. Specifically, go to this one. You’ll be dining outside in the middle of a beautiful park in the heart of the city. You’ll get to see the Flatiron building too!

After lunch, we headed west to Chelsea and the Chelsea High Line walk. The high line is a former elevated rail line converted to a park. It is about a 1.5 mile walk from end to end and provides great views of city life in addition to being a beautifully done preservation project and park.

And the dream end to an amazing day? A New York Jets game at MetLife Stadium! I have been a Jets fan for a while now, so this was something I really wanted to do. I bought tickets for the Monday night game months in advance. We parked off site and took a bus to the game, which I think would be the way to go. However, on the night we went, because the Jets were doing horribly and it was late in the season, we probably could have found excellent parking at the stadium There were NO crowds at this game. And….the Jets also lost horribly. It was a bummer that my one and only game was such a junky one, but I did not let that fact steal my joy that I was really at MetLife taking in a game with my favorite team!

]]>https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/26/kcsfab40-trip-day-five/feed/0halfadozenarrows20161205_10401220161205_10470620161205_11103220161205_11120920161205_14385720161205_14442220161205_14443520161205_22513520161205_20243720161205_19290020161205_191916#kcsfab40 Trip – DAY FOUR!https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/26/kcsfab40-trip-day-four/
https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/26/kcsfab40-trip-day-four/#respondMon, 26 Jun 2017 17:22:19 +0000http://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/?p=684Continue reading #kcsfab40 Trip – DAY FOUR!]]>We woke up on a beautiful Sunday in Jersey City and started our day in Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village. One really fun and free activity in NYC is people watching, and this was an awesome location for that! Washington Square Park is an iconic New York spot that you may recognize from a movie or two. Here is a glimpse of it in the movie that comes to MY mind when I see it. It may or may not be because this particular movie STILL give me nightmares!

It has been a public park since 1827, long before our state was even a state (did you know I love history and have a history degree?) Does anyone see a resemblance between the man in my photo below and a certain former president?

After a visit to the park and a stroll through Greenwich Village and NYU, we got to meet up with a friend from back home and her husband near Little Italy and Chinatown. It was such a treat to see her after 20 years and we had a blast catching up over coffee and pastries at Cafe Integral – I recommend a stop into this quaint little coffee shop!

We explored Chinatown and Little Italy for a while, having lunch at an amazing little Italian place called Cafe Napoli and buying cannolis and nougat from street vendors. Then we headed back to Central Park for a while (we can’t resist Central Park!) before making a trip up to Harlem. For dinner we stopped at Gray’s Papaya hot dogs on the Upper West side. This is another spot you may recognize from a movie or two – it’s talked about in one of my favorites, Fools Rush In!

The famous Apollo theater in Harlem

Gray’s Papaya is located on the Upper West side, at 72nd Street and Broadway/Amsterdam.

]]>https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/26/kcsfab40-trip-day-four/feed/0halfadozenarrowsiamlegend1815268004_10211134535263447_4022121046545658625_n15268058_10211133120468078_7836571597587155459_n20161204_171326featured-on-the-movie#kcsfab40 Trip – DAY THREE!https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/21/kcsfab40-trip-day-three/
https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/21/kcsfab40-trip-day-three/#respondWed, 21 Jun 2017 17:11:51 +0000http://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/?p=630Continue reading #kcsfab40 Trip – DAY THREE!]]>Day three of our trip was a FULL day covering 3 of New York City’s 5 boroughs and completing my goal of visiting all five!

We woke up and took the bus into the Port Authority bus terminal in Manhattan, and then hopped on the subway to Brooklyn, where we walked around and got THESE amazing views.

After taking in the views of lower Manhattan on a day that couldn’t be any more beautiful and clear (even if it was chilly for us SoCal folks), we walked across the Brooklyn Bridge.

The bridge is just over a mile long and the architecture and views make it worth every step. It’s amazing to set foot on one of the most iconic landmarks in the world and know it has been there for over 130 years! Being on the bridge with all the other tourists and locals reminded me of one of the things I loved from my first visit to the city seven years earlier – there are people from all over the world in New York!

After we crossed into Manhattan, we headed down to the southern tip to the Whitehall station for the Staten Island Ferry.

The Staten Island ferry transports passengers between southern Manhattan and the northern part of Staten Island. There is no cost for passengers and it is a nice, smooth 5 mile ride that provides amazing views of the city and the Statue of Liberty. We didn’t really have the time or an overwhelming desire to go directly to the Statue of Liberty but were thrilled to get to see her this closely during our day.

We realized pretty quickly after setting foot on Staten Island that there is not much to do on Staten Island. We walked around for a bit and headed back to the ferry terminal. Let me highly recommend the pizza place inside the ferry terminal, though. We grabbed a couple of slices before heading back to Manhattan – super cheap and so delicious!

Back in Manhattan, we decided to head toward the site of the World Trade Center. This was on our agenda for Monday (2 days later), but we were both really drawn to seeing it as soon as possible. The last time I was in Manhattan in 2010, this was still a hole in the ground with large fencing around it and nothing to really see except a very sad, empty space. It was amazing to see how much had changed in less than seven years.

Before our trip, Brian had been told of a former student from his school and local resident who had died on one of the planes on September 11th, so we spent some time searching for her name and a moment reflecting on the enormity of that day. Seeing thousands of names etched into these fountains was overwhelming and a bit emotional.

When visiting this part of New York, you MUST take the time to stop by St. Paul’s. Built in 1766, it survived a great fire and was where George Washington attended services following his inauguration in 1789. From their webpage:

“After September 11, 2001, St. Paul’s became the site of an extraordinary, round-the-clock relief ministry to rescue and recovery workers for nine months. Though the World Trade Center buildings collapsed just across the street, there was no damage to St. Paul’s, earning it the nickname “the little chapel that stood.””

Following our time at the 9/11 memorial, we decided to go off-agenda one more time and take the subway to Central Park. Central Park is easily one of my top five places on planet earth and I could not wait to show Brian and see the joy on his face! It was just stunning, as always, with a few hints of fall still lingering around on December 3rd.

After strolling in the park, we headed down to Chelsea. Here is something you need to know when traveling to New York City: bathrooms WILL be a challenge. It is important to know what stops in your itinerary will have good bathrooms and use them when you have the chance. We were on the hunt for bathrooms in Chelsea and realized our best bet was to find a restaurant, order food so we were paying customers, and use theirs. We ended up at a cute 24/7 longtime diner called Chelsea Square, where we indulged on cheese fries and cheesecake.

It was an awesome and exhausting day, and we couldn’t wait to have a whole new set of adventures the following day.

Kelli’s Travel Tips from this day:

If you only have one chance to walk the Brooklyn Bridge, do it from the Brooklyn side and walk into Manhattan. The views are stunning! Spend some time on the Brooklyn side before you make your way across. Or, if you have time, it would be fun to walk BOTH ways!

The Staten Island ferry has plenty of room. It seems crazy and crowded in that terminal, but everyone gets on and everyone has a seat (at least on our day they did!)

Staten Island is nice, but not worth a big visit. Most people get off the ferry in Staten Island, turn around and get right back in line to go back. There is not much to see in the terminal, but that PIZZA PLACE…I’m dreaming of it right now!

There will never be enough time to get enough Central Park. Please block out more time for it than you think you need. There are still some things in there I haven’t gotten to see after being in the park 5 or 6 times!

]]>https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/21/kcsfab40-trip-day-three/feed/0halfadozenarrows20161203_10130720161203_10381820161203_11121720161203_11402220161203_13374120161203_13412620161203_13501820161203_15363520161203_15265420161203_150200#kcsfab40 Trip – DAY TWO!https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/19/kcsfab40-trip-day-two/
https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/19/kcsfab40-trip-day-two/#respondMon, 19 Jun 2017 19:35:06 +0000http://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/?p=579Continue reading #kcsfab40 Trip – DAY TWO!]]>On day two of our trip, we woke up in the beautiful Berkshires near Lee, Massachusetts. We stayed at the Black Swan Inn, and HIGHLY recommend it for your visit to the area. It is situated right on Laurel Lake, with beautiful mountain and water views. I can imagine in the summer time it would be a really fun place to stay with the kids and enjoy the water. For us on this early December morning it was a stunning place to wake up to. We had breakfast overlooking the water while we prepped for a full day of adventure!
The view of Laurel Lake from the back steps of the Black Swan Inn – Lee, MA

The town of Lee, Massachusetts was so adorably impressive that I started envisioning what it would be like to live there. That’s saying a lot considering how much I LOVE where we live! We drove through Lee and hopped on the Massuchusetts turnpike, heading East and South through the region.

We drove through Springfield, Mass. and then from the top to the bottom of Connecticut, including Hartford. Our morning pitstop was Yale University. On a trip to Boston we had visited Harvard, so we thought it would be appropriate to make this stop. And, now we can say we went to Harvard and Yale, so there’s that.

Yale was picturesque, beautiful, and as “Ivy League” as we could have imagined. We parked and walked around campus and the nearby shopping area for a while before getting back on the road.

Lunch was a stop in Westport, Connecticut at the Black Duck Cafe, which is a former circa 1840 barge, now turned tavern right on the Saugatuck River. I was feeling brave and asked them to give me their most popular item, which turned out to be a Lobster Roll, one of the “official” foods of Connecticut. It wasn’t my thing, but I was proud of myself for trying!

After lunch, we made our way west toward New York City and the rest of our trip. I cannot describe the excitement that I was feeling as we got closer and closer!

We stopped in Queens and saw the Mets stadium along with Arthur Ashe stadium and the site of the US Open. We followed that with a drive into the Bronx, a quick stop to see Yankee Stadium, and a crossing over the George Washington bridge through the tip of Manhattan into New Jersey.

Once we arrived in New Jersey, we stopped at Walmart to grab groceries and some New York Jets gear, and then we checked into our little AirBnb apartment in Jersey City. We had the sweetest hostess – I’ll share the details of our place in another post since we do happily recommend it!

We thought we would be too exhausted to do anything else on that Friday night, but we really wanted to watch some college football playoffs and didn’t have cable, so we rallied and took a bus into Manhattan to watch football at Buffalo Wild Wings Times Square after a long walk around midtown!

Kelli’s travel tips from this day:

Flushing Meadows/Corona Park is worth a visit and pretty easy! Parking is free at the Queens Museum, which would also be a fun things to explore, and there were no crowds around as we checked out the Unisphere and park.

If you are staying in Jersey City/Hoboken, look for info on the smaller buses. The one we used at the recommendation of our AirBnb hostess was $3 each way and came by constantly. No worrying about bus schedules and stops. It literally would drop you off wherever you liked.

Times Square doesn’t seem to ever sleep. Even being there from 9 pm until after midnight there wasn’t plenty to see and do, but the crowds were less insane. As touristy and cliche as it is, it’s still worth seeing, and late at night may be the best time to take in all the lights without being packed in like sardines!

]]>https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/19/kcsfab40-trip-day-two/feed/0halfadozenarrows20161202_07382420161202_193754#kcsfab40 trip – DAY ONE!https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/14/kcsfab40-trip-day-one/
https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/14/kcsfab40-trip-day-one/#respondWed, 14 Jun 2017 21:22:08 +0000http://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/?p=543Continue reading #kcsfab40 trip – DAY ONE!]]>Our amazing trip to the northeast began with a red-eye flight from LAX to Newark. We landed in Newark around 6:00 a.m. on December 1st, picked up our rental car, and excitedly drove south with the goal of crossing the Pennsylvania/Delaware state line and crossing another state off of our checklist.

We enjoyed driving through a more spread out, quiet part of New Jersey than we were expecting. And we realized that our little toll roads in Orange County are nothing compared to the nonstop tolls we were paying on the Jersey Turnpike!

After officially setting foot in Delaware, we turned around and drove a few minutes back into Pennsylvania for a morning in Philadelphia. By the way, at this point, we had slept maybe 3 hours on the plane in the last 24 hours.

We took some time to stop by and see the Liberty Bell before going on a great tour of Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence was signed. And because, well, we were in Philly, we had to try a legit Philly Cheesesteak before getting back on the road, even though it was 10:30 in the morning!

We were thrilled to be ahead of our itinerary’s schedule at this point, and knew the lack of sleep was going to catch up with us, so we got back on the road and headed north, through New Jersey and into New York state. At this point, we were taking turns driving and resting!

Our time on the road took us through some pretty and very low-traffic woodsy, hilly areas. A part of New York that we were excited to see before heading into the big city for a while! After passing through Albany, which was much prettier than I expected, we had dinner at our favorite, go-to road trip spot, Cracker Barrel, before continuing to our destination for the night.Another state crossed off the list on the evening of day one, Vermont! We visited Bennington briefly, known for it’s covered bridges like this one. It would have been cool to have time to see more.

After our Vermont detour, we drove south into the Berkshires in Massachussetts, eventually landing at our destination for night 1, the Black Swan Inn. More on that under day 2!

****Kelli’s Travel Tips for this day’s itinerary***

Bring tons of quarters with you when traveling this part of the country. We brought a ziploc FULL of change with us and it came in incredibly handy when dealing with all the tolls/bridges, etc.

Visiting downtown Philadephia was a breeze on a weekday morning. Park near the Liberty Bell in the underground garage below the Independence Visitor’s center (we entered on 4th street between Arch and Market). You could spend MUCH more time in this area than we were able to. But in a pinch, you could see the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall, including a short tour, in an hour.

]]>https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/06/14/kcsfab40-trip-day-one/feed/0halfadozenarrows20161201_081117-120161201_14182820161201_161909KC’s Fab 40 Trip – East Coast Lovehttps://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/05/17/kcs-fab-40-trip-east-coast-love/
https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/05/17/kcs-fab-40-trip-east-coast-love/#respondWed, 17 May 2017 18:15:42 +0000http://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/?p=526Continue reading KC’s Fab 40 Trip – East Coast Love]]>Months later, I STILL can not stop thinking about our trip to New York and the northeast for my 40th birthday. I’m beyond obsessed with that part of the country. I’m not sure if it’s because it is so different from where we call home. I like to think it is because we have been blessed to have lived in three corners of the U.S., and that is the mysterious fourth corner we will never live in (but I NEVER say never, so…)

I started planning this trip for my 39th birthday in early 2015. I had been to NYC for the first time back in 2010 but had gone without Brian so I had been anxiously waiting for the chance to take him with me.

However, plans were thwarted in 2015 with the news of this dude’s upcoming arrival and a due date just a couple weeks after my 39th birthday.

I suppose those luscious cheeks and the last year of snuggles and slobbery kisses were worth postponing our trip, but I knew NOTHING would stop us from going for my 40th. I lined up help with the kids (thanks, mom and dad!) months in advance, and started purchasing flights and booking rooms by August for our December adventure. We packed so much into the trip that I’m going to create a post for each day with everything we did and learned!

]]>https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/05/17/kcs-fab-40-trip-east-coast-love/feed/0halfadozenarrows6dcfcb3d-dd51-49ef-a773-c4fd3371c16dIt’s Okay to Blink – thoughts from 8/2/2016https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/01/25/its-okay-to-blink/
https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/01/25/its-okay-to-blink/#respondWed, 25 Jan 2017 22:22:51 +0000http://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/?p=365Continue reading It’s Okay to Blink – thoughts from 8/2/2016]]>I wrote this blog post on Alli’s 18th birthday almost half a year ago, but never published it. There are a LOT of emotions that go into having a child turn 18, and we’ve been on a bit of a wild ride since that time that we are still working out. But as I re-read this post draft today, I realized I did want to preserve this story and the feelings from the day.

I woke up today as the parent of an “adult” child. It doesn’t feel like yesterday that we brought her home from the hospital. I didn’t just blink and suddenly have an 18 year old. It mostly feels like ages and ages of forever. I try so hard to remember what it was like back then but it’s foggy and I can’t pull up the memories clearly enough.

I was 21, a newlywed army wife 800 or so miles away from family. We lived in the crappiest apartment next to the army base. We called it the ghetto apartment. It was $415 a month and the carpet was worn through. There were no screens on the windows but it didn’t matter. You couldn’t open them without hearing the neighbors tv or smelling somebody cooking fried chicken. We had one little car that we shared, a whole lot of hand me down furniture, and we were young and in love and happy.

We didn’t find out if our firstborn was going to be a boy or girl ahead of time. We wanted to, but the army only provided one ultrasound and she decided not to cooperate. We had names picked out (Collin for a boy, Allissa for a girl). I DESPERATELY wanted a girl. My life and all happiness depended on it. I’m thankful to Corbin and Pierce for later teaching me that boys are pretty awesome, too.

The moment finally came on August 2, 1998. I woke up in labor at 3:30 a.m. and nine long hours later it was time for us to become parents. My heart was racing waiting to hear if I got my girl. I had a moment of panic that it would be a boy and I would not love him. The baby arrived and the doctor told Brian to announce the gender to me. My dear husband looked up and shouted “It’s a baby!”

Many “blinks” have gone by to get us from then to now. She has survived the arrival of five new siblings and tried her hand at soccer, gymnastics, cheer, ballet, theater, and piano lessons. We have gotten through great years in school and not-so-great years, and making a permanent decision to homeschool in 10th grade ended up being the best fit. Alli has gotten to live in three different states and experience life in different (VERY different) parts of the country, and is happy and blessed to have rounded out a great childhood here where our hearts are happiest.

It has been a wild ride. Alli has kept me on my toes for 18 years and forced me to grow and go places I didn’t think I could. She is serious and full of empathy. She is passionate, sometimes to a fault. She loves God, her family, long car rides, and music. She has a gift and love for working with children and those with special needs. Most importantly, she has a love for God and is on fire for the Lord with her faith. She is fearless about sharing it and I can see Him working in her life every single day. If Brian and I did nothing right on this parenting journey except get our kids to church and teach them that their faith should be top priority while encouraging them to make it their own, I’m good with that. And God gets all the glory.

Time can seem to have flown by in the blink of an eye, but it is still okay to blink because that is life. I am so excited to see what is next in this journey of hers! Happiest of birthdays to the one who made me a mom!!!!

]]>https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/01/25/its-okay-to-blink/feed/0halfadozenarrowsFB_IMG_1467060508323Mighty and Threehttps://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/01/06/mighty-and-three/
https://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/2017/01/06/mighty-and-three/#respondFri, 06 Jan 2017 05:53:51 +0000http://halfadozenarrows.wordpress.com/?p=516Continue reading Mighty and Three]]>Oh my, this arrow #5 keeps me on my toes. Just today, she decided to pee on the front step. Yes, pee. She also spilled a full glass of milk at dinner, she played with play-dough on my couch, got crumbs in my bed, and as you can see from the photo, she put a bit of lipstick on.